


we always knew

by astromena



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Canon Compliant, Everyone's sad, Introspection, Light Angst, M/M, barba is sad, but i guess everything works out in the end, im just filling up the blanks and givin everyone the goodbyes the deserve cuz c'mon, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-08
Updated: 2018-02-08
Packaged: 2019-03-15 11:01:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13611975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astromena/pseuds/astromena
Summary: Change stops hurting once it becomes unnoticeable.





	we always knew

**Author's Note:**

  * For [svu writers](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=svu+writers).



> this is completely un-beta'd, if there are any grammatical/spelling mistakes please let me know! english isn't my first language and it's fucking four am as im posting this sooooo...

* * *

Rafael pours himself another glass of scotch. He’s lost count of how many he’s had at this point. He looks ahead. There are boxes of various sized scattered around the entire office. Rafael sighs.

He finishes off his drink in one long sip and inwardly curses once he notices the bottle is empty. Rafael wishes he could pour himself one more drink. He’s already said goodbye to Carmen, who - despite all his insistence to do the contrary- helped him pack most of his stuff but what remained on his desk. He hasn’t said goodbye to anybody else. He wishes he didn’t have to.

Rafael relishes on the feeling of his leather chair for a moment and stands up, walking away from his desk to the center of the office, analyzing the emptiness of it all, taking it in slowly.

It takes him a total of fifteen minutes to take a medium-sized box from the floor and finally start clearing up his desk.

First goes the empty bottle of scotch. He decides he can’t just throw it away. Not tonight. Not ever. Then go the pens and the little statues and metal toys he fidgeted with sometimes, a couple legal pads he always kept for note-taking purposes, his favorite notebook.

He goes around the desk, blunt fingertips brushing the dark wood of it as he gets to the drawers. In one there’s yet another legal pad and a couple bic pens he’ll save for later. There’s also a playbill from that time he went to see Hamilton and had to go to his office to start building his case afterwards. He smiles at the memory of the squad joking about him barging in with a tux.

It’s the first time Rafael has smiled that day.

He moves on to the next drawer, there’s a tin of mints, some book he doesn’t care about right now, and a picture.

Rafael’s eyes get teary as he takes it in his hands. “I’m sorry I let you down, abuelita.” he says, running a finger around the frame, caressing it to then lay it carefully on the bottom of the box. He gains a little of his composure back and goes around the desk again to collect the last belonging sitting there.

Rafael looks down at his nameplate, thinking about the moment he first laid it on that desk.

He thinks about the man who’d set that plate there. How much he’s changed ever since. His views, his way of handling things and the way he spoke. How much he’s learned. About fairness and rightfulness and justice and how fucked up the justice system truly is. Because if fucking is, and if there’s one thing Rafael both hates and loves with the same raging passion, it’s the Law itself.

Rafael thinks about how tired he is. He remembers the nights he lost to studying for the Bar Examination, and that time he spilled coffee all over his final paper but didn’t realize until he was handling it to his teacher.

He decides it hurts to remember, so he takes his nameplate with both his hands, holding it firmly, looks down to it one last time, and sets it on the box, right on top of the picture.

He closes the box and tapes it down. He won’t open it in a long time.

Rafael picks up a black bic pen, the legal pad from the desk, and sits down to write...But something doesn’t feel right, so he goes back to the box where he put his fancy pens and rummages through another one to find a sheet of printer paper.

Once he has everything set, Rafael begins:

 

_To Sonny._

 

* * *

 

There’s an uncanny feeling at the precinct. Or maybe Rafael’s just paranoid...or drunk. He doesn’t have the energy to analyze what he’s feeling at the moment.

He strolls down a corridor and through the cubicles until he finds Sergeant Tutuola and Detective Rollins at their desks. He wonders why they’re still there. He doesn’t look at the other desk.

Rollins stands up as soon as she notices Rafael’s presence, Sergeant Fin looks up at him from his desk, offering him a modest grin. Judging by both their faces, Rafael can easily tell they already know what he’s here for.

“Hey, this whole thing was messy. But man, I really wanna thank you,for all you did for us.”

“Especially that one time you saved my ass from jail.” Fin says, Rollins chuckles at his remark and Rafael manages to smile. A weary, ephemeral smile. He thanks Fin for making him smile.

“You were good Barba.” Rollins adds, she purses her lips and pats Rafael’s back before walking to the vending machine.

He stands there for a while. Tapping his foot on the floor as he decides what to do next.

There’s a desk behind him he’s willingly ignored from the moment he stepped in the precinct. And there’s an envelope in his hands he’s got to place on the aforementioned desk.

Rafael wishes things would be easier.

Detective Rollins comes back and eyes Rafael as she sits on her desk and unwraps her snack. She looks at the envelope, as if she were trying to decipher what was scribbled on it. Rafael notices this. He knows how quick Rollins is to jump to connect the dots and jump to conclusions. So he turns, takes a couple steps and places the envelope on the empty desk behind him. 

He doesn’t look back when he walks out the door.

* * *

 

It’s been two days since Rafael Barba waved the DA's office goodbye.

The squad is at the precinct, checking some paperwork, taking calls here and there. Everything’s quiet. The door to Liv’s office is locked.

Detective Carisi shows up for the first time ever since the trial. Nobody had bothered to ask why he’d been absent. It is pointless to question the obvious.

Carisi puts down the phone and looks up at Rollins, who has been staring at him for what felt like the last ten hours.

“You still haven’t seen it?” Rollins asks, eyeing his desk and Carisi furrows his brow at her question. Seen what? He wants to ask. But the words can’t escape his mouth, instead, he searches his desk for whatever object Amanda wants him to see.

Carisi’s breath hitches when he spots the envelope next to his pencil holder.

The words “Detective Carisi” are written on the back, it’s a familiar handwriting.

He opens the envelope with fiery eagerness. He hopes it doesn’t hurt.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

To Sonny.

This isn’t the way I intended things to go. I think you know it. You always know in the end.

I think that’s what I liked—what I like the most about you. How you always know. How you ramble and trail off and miss the point a billion times when you speak but you still manage to make sense.

I teased because I knew. You teased because you knew. You always did.

You’d always go off about how much you’d learned from me but Sonny, you’ve taught me so much in the last couple of years.

A sad sheet of paper and some runny ink wouldn’t do it justice. 

That thing you said back at the precinct that day — _"Guess I'll stay a cop"_ it broke my heart Sonny.

It hurt me so bad because I knew.

I knew how passionate you were about the Law, and how happy you were to have passed the Bar and gotten your license and wow, I was so proud of you Sonny. I still am. You've changed so much. And I know you say it's mostly because of what you've learned from me but please. You've grown not because of what I've shown you, but because of what you've shown yourself.

You started growing the moment you allowed yourself to embrace the things that scared you the most.

Sonny. 

The next time you go into that office, there will probably be someone else sitting at the desk that once was mine.

But just like the seasons; winter strips lush trees from their greenness, autumn turns leaves into crunchy, warm, fragile things blown by the wind in the blink of an eye and we don't say a damn thing because we're so used to it. Change stops hurting once it becomes unnoticeable. 

Whatever path I choose after this, please know, dear Sonny, that you're welcome to follow it with me. No pressure there. But think about it. 

I'll always be here for you Sonny, but I don't think I need to tell you that. 

You already know.


End file.
